


Put Me Six Feet Down

by Atlas_M_33



Series: The Bonds That Tie [2]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Altean mind tech, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Flashbacks, I'm proud of it anyway, M/M, Memory Loss, Nightmares, Temporary Amnesia, but not a lot, shiro angst, this was really self indulgent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-10
Updated: 2017-09-10
Packaged: 2018-12-25 22:29:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,418
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12045615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Atlas_M_33/pseuds/Atlas_M_33
Summary: "We know there's something in that head of yours that you're hiding from us Champion. And once we get rid of it, you'll be our perfect weapon. You'll be unstoppable."~~~A few weeks after he recovers his memories of Keith, Shiro is plagued by a nightmare he can't remember.





	Put Me Six Feet Down

**Author's Note:**

> I was planning on having this out last week but Stuff happened and there was a delay. But it's here now, so please enjoy part two of Shiro Hurts Emotionally But It All Turns Out Alright In The End!

They come for him after the match. 

It's been months at this point, so Shiro doesn't bother fighting them anymore. Not when any physical struggle will be met by the druid's dark lightning. He doesn't know what they have in store for him today, can't afford to have his mind muddled by the pain of their magic. 

When he finally sees where they're headed Shiro's glad that he's chosen that route. 

The druids steer him towards the chair, sharp and cold in the harsh lighting of the room. The chair means interrogation, questions about who he is and what he knows. Shiro should feel relieved, interrogation is better than the experiments. Except-

He isn't. Because the witch stopped asking about Earth some time ago. Lately her questions have been centered on him, and Shiro can feel the fear beginning to curl in the bottom of his stomach. Lately her questions have been about what he's hiding in his mind that keeps him soft and sane and alive. 

Lately, though she doesn't know it, her questions have been about Keit-

Shiro wakes up. 

He's in his room on the Castle of Lions, sitting upright in bed and panting. Next to him Keith makes a sleepy noise before shifting closer, the faint blue lights of the night cycle playing off of his cheekbones. 

Blue. Shiro doesn't know why that's what stands out to him the most right now, his nightmare faint and already half-forgotten. Instead of pondering it he settles back into the bed, curling around Keith and sinking back into sleep. 

~~~

When he rolls out of bed to go to breakfast in the morning, Shiro doesn't even remember having a nightmare. 

~~~

The witch is looming over him, her white hair swaying in the currents created by the recycled air running through the ship. Her glowing yellow eyes add to the effect, and with her hood drawn over her face the way it is she looks like the monster in the movies his parents always told him not to watch. 

Sometimes he wishes he had listened. 

"We know there's something in that head of yours that you're hiding from us Champion. It's only a matter of time until we dig it out." The witch hunches over him even more, reaching out to trace her claws along his jawline. "And once we get rid of it, whatever it is you're holding onto that's making you soft, you'll be our perfect weapon. You'll be unstoppable." 

Her hands are starting to glow, the dense luminescent purple spreading to encompass everything. He's strapped down, the witch still determined to find what she's looking for even after all her unsuccessful searches. The worst part is that this time he knows she's going to find it. Shiro had known he wouldn't be able to hide it forever, but he'd at least thought it would be longer than this. 

He can feel the magic starting to work, inky tendrils racing through his mind. She's almost there. After all this time she's going to get what she wants, she's going to take Kei-

There are hands cradling his face. 

"That's it spaceman. Come back to me."

There are hands cradling his face and a forehead pressed against his own and when Shiro finally opens his eyes he's looking right at Keith, breathtakingly beautiful even when half asleep and startled. 

Shiro snorts and finally pulls his breathing into a controlled pattern of inhalations and exhalations. Keith pulls back slightly and regards him with mild suspicion. 

"What's so funny?" Keith knows Shiro's strange sense of humor, can probably tell from the look on Shiro's face that he's laughing at something no one else would find funny. Shiro leans in again. 

"Keith you're breathtaking." Keith's face goes deadpan, looking down as he raises a hand to knead at his temples. Shiro can see him smiling though, so he carries on. "Get it? Because I was having trouble-"

Keith shakes his head, a small smile tugging at his lips, and pulls Shiro back to him. "Don't worry. I get your death joke."

Shiro chuckles. "Just checking." They sit in silence, curling into each other. The quiet is comforting, and after a few moments the mood turns serious again. 

"What did you see Shiro?" Keith's concern is tangible in the quiet warp of his voice through the air, comforting without being demanding. Shiro loves him so much, this human being made of rough edges and sharp corners who was willing to pull down his walls for Shiro. He tries to remember what he had seen in the dream, he really does. 

He just can't seem to grasp it. 

"I- I don't know." Keith doesn't say anything then, just pulls Shiro down so that his head rests on Keith's shoulder and begins to hum one of the lullabies that he picked up from the Altean language program. 

~~~

Shiro sleeps soundly through the rest of the night. 

~~~

He's strapped down to the chair with the witch standing over him and her fluid magic sloshing freely through his mind. Shiro can feel it, heavy and slimy and reaching for his center, for the ball of light that means Keith.

No. That won't do. They've taken his crew and his freedom and his sanity. They don't get to take Keith. 

Shiro crams the light down, locking it up tightly and tossing the key away just as the magic races by, finding nothing in his mind precious enough to be ripped away, finding nothing to explain what he fights for. Distantly Shiro hears the witch shriek her anger and watches her fling two of her assistants aside as she storms out of the room, obviously frustrated with her lack of progress. Her absence prompts the guards to return Shiro to his cell. He hangs between them, numb, all energy focused inwards. The entire time only one thought sticks in his head. 

He'd had… something. There was something he was protecting from her, some light she had wanted. 

What was it again? 

Shiro chases the thoughts around his head, catching them for only a moment-

Keith oh Keith he was trying to protect Keith don't let the witch take him have to hide him she'll look again

-before the light sinks down into the bottom of his mind. He doesn't follow it, allows himself to be tossed into his cell numbly. 

The next day when he is thrown into the arena the light is a barely there thought in the back of his mind before it fades away completely. 

Distracted by the emptiness in the back of his head, Shiro makes a mistake in the ring for the first time in a long time. 

It loses him the fight.

The next day they replace his hand.

Shiro bolts awake, a bitten off cry pulled from his throat as he yanks himself into consciousness. Behind him Keith jerks awake as well, already fully alert and pulling Shiro to him. On the other side of the lounge Pidge and Lance pause their video game, concern written across their faces as Keith brings Shiro back to the present. 

"It's alright spaceman, I've got you. I've got you Shiro." When Shiro's finally calm again and Keith manages eye contact he looks at Shiro and asks a question he usually hates the answer to. "What did you remember?"

Shiro know his exhaustion shows in his voice when he replies. "I didn't. I don't know what that was." He closes his eyes, takes a deep breath and tries to push his thoughts in the direction of the dream. "I think," He pauses, takes a moment to rein in the terror in his gut. "I think it's the same dream. Memory. Whatever." Shiro raises the hand that isn't tangled with Keith's to rub at his eye, and it has to be a memory that's plaguing him because the headache is back, the same one he had right before he recovered his memories of Keith. "I think it's the same one I've been having for the past few days."

Keith is quiet for a moment, lifting his hand and combing his fingers through Shiro's forelock soothingly, brushing his thumb over his temple to rub out some of the tension. "Shiro if this dream is bothering you let us help." 

Keith purposefully angles his head so that Shiro can't look away from his bright eyes. He's not above using them to get what he wants. Shiro lowers his head in defeat, resting it on Keith's shoulder and sighing. "Fine." From the corner of the room Shiro hears Lance as he leans over to whisper to Pidge. 

"Whiiiipped."

The hot rush of embarrassment Shiro feels is worth the pained grunt when Pidge elbows Lance in the stomach sharply. He hides his smile in Keith's shirt. 

~~~

A few days later Pidge comes to them with a solution, sitting him and Keith down on the floor of the trading room before starting. "Hunk and I modified some of the old tech I found down in the storage bay. The basic idea is that with someone else there to watch the dream with you, you'll be able to hold onto the details. These," they gestured with the tech in their hands. "induce an artificial sleep cycle, so the dream should occur the same way it does naturally." 

They hand Shiro a headset first. It's vaguely reminiscent of the ones they use in training: the shape is almost the same, but the one he's holding now is bulkier, the metal a dark gray rather then the silver white he's used to. Its weight is a reassuring pressure as he settles it on his head, heavier than it had looked when he'd accepted it.

Pidge continues their explanation. "The reason you can't remember what you're dreaming is that your brain is trying to remember and forget at the same time. But by linking your minds together, Keith see's what you do and we can use him as a filter so that doesn't happen, like having someone else send you a file that doesn't open. Does that make sense?" 

Keith nods and puts on his headset. Shiro tries not to snicker at the way it flattens his bangs across his forehead. Fails. Gets a halfhearted glare from Keith and replies with an unrepentant grin that only gets Shiro an eye roll and a gentle elbow to the ribs. He turns back to Pidge who's eyeing them with amusement. 

"Fire it up."

~~~

The device does its job quickly. As soon as Shiro closes his eyes he can feel himself being pushed into sleep. Suddenly the dream is coming back to him, all the moments he'd lost falling back in order with an off-putting abruptness. 

Shiro being dragged from his cell by Haggar's druids after a grueling match. 

The chair he was strapped to in the interrogation room and the fear that had stirred because of the direction the questions had been taking. 

The way Haggar had gotten impatient and decided to go digging for answers instead. 

Twisted magic crawling through his brain, cloying and only half tangible. 

The way he had buried Keith, fast and deep, putting him away to protect him from inky blackness. 

The way Shiro had forgotten. 

~~~

This time Shiro and Keith wake up together. 

~~~

Waking up isn't like falling asleep was, just a sudden awareness plunged upon them that has Shiro reaching for Keith automatically. They're still on the floor of the training room and Pidge jumps minutely when Shiro bursts into sudden motion. 

"Did it work? You weren't under for nearly as long as I thought you'd be." Their question goes ignored, not because it was unheard, but because Shiro is too busy relearning the shape of Keith's face for a third time, searing it into his brain so that it'll never again be removed. 

Not even by himself. 

"It was me. It was my fault. She didn't take you from me, I buried you." Shiro's got his hands on Keith's face, thumbs rubbing over his cheekbones. Shiro knows he shouldn't be this worked up, but for a moment, a horrifying, gut-wrenching moment, he had felt the emptiness again, the void in his mind where Keith was supposed to be. 

Keith reaches up, securing a hand around each of Shiro's wrists and pulling them firmly away from his face, expression neutral. For the first time in a long time, Shiro has no idea what is going on in Keith Kogane's mind.

Shiro's heart drops into his stomach. He knew that eventually something would happen, a nightmare or a flashback or one too many dates ruined by an unknown trigger, and then Keith would finally realize he was much too good for someone as broken as Shiro. 

But then there are tears running down Keith's face, his arms are wrapping around Shiro, fingers twisting into hair, pulling their foreheads together as Keith sobs quietly. "I love you. I love you so much, how could you ever think I'd blame you? For anything that happened? That you had to do? You came back to me." Keith pulls Shiro away, hands moving to cradle his jaw. "You came back to me Shiro. You kept your promise."

Shiro can feel his face crumble as the tears he's been holding back finally break free. He slumps forward, curling around and into Keith, clutching him as tightly as possible. "I love you too flyboy. More than anything."

They sit there, grinning at each other like loons. Shiro is far too happy right now to spare any thought at all for how ridiculous he must look and he knows Keith must feel the same, but if Keith can put aside his discomfort with public displays of affection for Shiro like this than Shiro can do the same for Keith. 

They're both too wrapped up in each other to notice when Pidge sneaks off of the training deck, a smug but happy look on their face as the door slides shut. 

~~~

Hours later they've moved to the observation deck, still wrapped around each other so tightly that Shiro can't tell where Keith ends and he begins. 

They're facing a window that's showing off a universe's worth of stars, but as Keith makes a soft noise from where he's fallen asleep on Shiro, hair in his mouth and cheek squished against Shiro's chest, Shiro looks away from the vastness of space to the star that's already in reach. 

Keith always was the only thing Shiro wanted more than the universe.

**Author's Note:**

> Yay! I'm not sure I liked this part of the story as much as the first, but this was also the first part I actually had an idea for, and I was really excited to write it. 
> 
> There will be a third part, because inspiration struck, but I'm still getting a feel for how a want it to go, so no predictions on when it'll be out. 
> 
> Comments appreciated!


End file.
